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I have some commentary up about wikis, both large, famous ones like Wikipedia and small ones with narrow focus.

The Carl Brandon wiki-ers ran into [some ugliness on Wikipedia] pretty soon after they started heavily editing, when a category they created–People of Color in SF–was nominated for deletion…

…This led to Carl Brandon members renewing their interest in having a CBS wiki, just as FeministSF.net has an FSFWiki. I think this is a great idea for many reasons, not the least of which is the nastiness one often experiences on Wikipedia. That nastiness has a few things at its core. One being that some people have serious power issues and play them out in whatever venue allows them to–Wikipedia is an easy fiefdom to conquer, if one has the time and no life. Another being that American culture, the culture which many people contributing to the English language Wikipedia are steeped in, often devalues the contributions of women and minorities, but does so in a backhanded way: by claiming that their contributions shouldn’t be called out on the basis of race or gender or nationality, but instead thrown in with the “mainstream”, which just happens to be overwhelmingly populated by white males.

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I'm a speculative fiction writer by night, a media critic and culture columnist by day, and an activist blogger in the interstices. I enjoy science fiction, fantasy, short stories, harshing your squee about that thing you love, and squeeing hard about that thing I love, in that order.